Karen Marsh

Karen Marsh is a PACFA counsellor with 25 years of professional experience. She works with people who feel overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, relationship strain, family conflict, trauma and anger. Karen aims to make starting therapy straightforward and supportive for someone seeking change.

Her approach is collaborative and down-to-earth. She listens to each person’s story and helps them notice strengths they already have. Sessions focus on practical steps people can use between appointments to manage strong feelings and improve communication.

Over a long career she has worked with a wide range of concerns linked to relationships and emotional pain. That includes abandonment, attachment issues, codependency, and family of origin problems. She also supports people dealing with panic, post-traumatic stress, guilt, shame and difficulties around forgiveness.

Karen uses several well-known approaches in her work, including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Attachment-Based Therapy, Client-Centred Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT). These methods guide how she helps people notice patterns, try new habits, and process difficult memories.

Her style is warm and respectful. She encourages small, manageable changes and helps people build clearer communication and healthier boundaries. To start, a person completes a short matching questionnaire and schedules a first appointment according to therapist availability.

How Karen's approaches translate to online work

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) helps people notice painful thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, and then choose values-based actions. It is useful for anxiety, stress and problems with motivation. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) focuses on the link between thoughts, feelings and actions, and gives practical techniques to reduce panic, worry and unhelpful behaviours. Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT) centres on patterns in emotional responses and helps people change how they connect and respond in close relationships.

Finding the right approach is part of the work. Karen will talk with each person about their goals and preferences, and together they decide which methods to try. That collaborative process helps shape the plan for sessions and the kind of homework or practice that will be helpful between appointments.

Confirm the current session formats before booking to know what is available. Online therapy can make it easier to fit sessions into a busy life, reduce travel time, and allow shorter check-ins when needed. Some approaches translate well to remote work because they rely on discussion, skills practice and guided exercises rather than physical materials. Ask about how sessions are scheduled and how homework or tools will be shared so arrangements suit day-to-day routines.